


Liminal

by orphan_account



Category: Narcos (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Dissociation, F/M, Heavy Angst, Mental Anguish, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Mild Smut, but not with each other and i'm not sorry about it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-12
Updated: 2020-02-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:07:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22684450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The best places to hold deep conversations are places where reality hangs in suspended animation.
Relationships: Javier Peña/Reader
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	Liminal

Bent over the arm of a disgusting couch as a man of whom you do not care to know the name rails you from behind is how most of your nights have gone this week. Perhaps it’d be nicer, a tad more respectable for you to be turned around, but it’s far easier to keep the strings detached when you’re not looking them in the face as you climax. Men are very emotional when it comes to sex sometimes.

Ass up, face pushed into the scratchy fabric, your only goal is to get some dopamine flooded into your brain until you’re right as rain again. You don’t do feelings. Your job requires a kind of mental stability that’s only obtained by becoming numb or thriving in the chaos. You’re not the latter so a permanently stoic disposition it is. What a depressing way to go about things, but it’s not as if you have a choice in the matter.

Besides, you’ve found a viable coping mechanism. So people view you as a whore now? It’s better than them knowing the real reason is that getting fucked is the only way you can forget about the six people you killed today. 

Because then they would suggest therapy, a solution you don’t have the money or the patience for. Or maybe the confidence, if that was something you could admit to yourself. There’s a lot of things you can’t admit to yourself, and wanting desperately to go back home is one of them. 

You have a duty to take down Escobar and you will see it through. But the scared, little girl inside of you is crying out for comfort and stability and safety in a place she recognizes. You’ll never be taken seriously again if people found that out. 

You snap, coming hard and fast, grunting out a  _ “fuck,”  _ into the crook of your arms. No stars, no feeling of bliss, no satisfaction, even. Just simple, animalistic pleasure keeping you bobbed above the waves until you have the use of your limbs again. 

“Así que, ¿cuándo te veré de nuevo”

Irritation flares across your face as you fix yourself, pulling clothes back on and smoothing out your hair. “No lo harás.”

Shuffling through your bag, making sure all of your shit is there (one of your quick fucks once tried to steal from you, so now you’re paranoid), you’re out the door with a monotone, “Gracias por esto, me iré ahora,” leaving your lips. 

Sentiment used to be a funny thing, now it only serves to make everything more complicated. 

Under this warm Medellín night, your body takes you back to your apartment near the American Embassy, but your mind continues to wander down winding alleys and twisted streets. Once there, you’ll feign sleep, go to work, and do it all over again with someone new. 

~ ~ ~

Javier has a favorite whorehouse and he may or may not have a few favorite whores, but they don’t know him. Sure, they know him better than he’d like them to because apparently he’s not as adept at keeping his emotions in check as he thinks. But they can’t read his mind and those are the kinds of things he’ll always keep chained up. 

Tonight, however, he can’t stop the brutal pace he’s established fucking—Vanessa, yeah, that’s her name—on all fours. Part him feels bad for this indignified position he’s put her in, despite knowing this is how she makes her money. But he doesn’t want her to see him, to see his vulnerability. 

He’s been told his eyes are expressive, and instead of taking it for the compliment that it was, he’s taken it for criticism. So long he’s been down here in Columbia, how many culprits looked him straight in the eye only to see the hesitation still there? He’s only human, but he doesn’t want to be. Not anymore. 

Vanessa’s room is filled with stupid neon lights that buzz with an annoying hum almost louder than their moaning. It also reeks with the stench of sex feebly covered by some flowery perfume. Her nightstand is covered with half-empty beer bottles and an overflowing ashtray, half of those discarded cigarette buds admittedly belonging to him. 

The thought of lighting another cancer stick to calm his constant anxiety has him thrusting for a quicker release. Almost there. Grunting with the effort, he pulls Vanessa up, back to chest, arm wrapped across her stomach, stuttering once, twice. A breathless groan into her ear as he climaxes, seed spilling into her. 

With a wince at the overstimulation, he pulls out of her, cock now limp, attention diverted to the box of Marlboro sitting next to the ashtray. Leaning back against the pillows, chest heaving and skin sticky with sweat, he lights the stick with an available match and relishes in the familiar burn throughout his lungs. 

“Siempre puedo decir cuando has tenido un día duro,” Vanessa says, voice husky and breathless as she moves to wrap a thin shawl around herself, “Te convierte en mi mejor cliente.”

Unrestrained anger boils inside Javier, almost spilling over as he quickly gathers what little shit he has. “Seguro que sí.”

He slams the door shut without a proper goodbye, quietly bracing himself for another sleepless night amid the hustle and bustle of Medellín’s streets.

~ ~ ~

Your key always gets jammed in your rusty lock. Typically, it only takes a few jiggles here and there, a hefty twist in which you slightly panic about breaking it in half, and a rather hard shoulder-shove into the door, but tonight you’re really not in the mood for this persistent fucking inconvenience.

Sighing, your head falls against your door in defeat, the cool wood soothing to your steadily growing headache. 

“Didn’t you file a complaint to the landlord three weeks ago?” Javier asks, having walked into the building only to see your slumped form leaning against the door to your apartment. Honestly, he feels how you look. 

Without turning around, you answer back in a muffled voice, “And two more each following week. Maybe I’ll just sleep out here on the cold, unforgiving tile.”

He’s got his own key in his lock. “You’re always welcome to crash on my couch.” Pushes the door open with ease.

You turn around now. “How many times have you had sex on that couch? No thanks.”

An offended  _ huff  _ falls from his lips. “Hypocritical coming from you.”

The amused smile playing at your own lips falls upon realizing he’s right. Guilt begins eating at you immediately. “I’m sorry, Javi, I just-”

There are quite a million reasons for an apology, but not a single one of them rises to the surface to be heard. Equal parts reluctance and indecisiveness, you suppose. But the abrupt stop hangs between you by a precarious tightrope of sudden tension. Neither of you knows what to say.

Javier knows your jibe wasn’t anything more than residual stress from work and whatever else must be chipping away at your mind. It’s not as if he can’t relate. You’ve both found your own ways of coping and there’s not a damn thing he could say that wouldn’t also sound just as hypocritical coming from him.

You slide pathetically to the hard floor, head thrown back with a  _ thunk _ . Maybe it’s an obligation. Maybe it’s a genuine concern. Either way, he shuts his door, puts away his key, and sits across from you in silence. 

He tries to watch you at first, but the second your head lifts up, eyes catching his, he finds a pretend fascination with the pattern of the tile. “I get it,” he says after a moment, attention still diverted to the floor, “The sex, I mean. I get it.”

You heave in a breath of air as if you’re going to say something, but all that comes out in a  _ huff _ , some semblance of a tired laugh. “I was gonna make a joke, but now’s not the time.” 

It’s an odd feeling, the seriousness of this moment not like a weight pushing on your shoulders but more as if you’ve sunken in deep water, limbs slowed with the time. One blink later and things outside of this dingy hallway don’t seem real anymore. The only thing grounding you is Javier’s presence straight across from you. You wonder if he feels the same or if you’ve simply become delusional. 

Javier finally manages to pick his gaze up off the floor. You’re still looking his way, but your eyes are past him, somewhere far away. He wonders where you’ve gone when suddenly you blink and the world rights itself again. Except, now he feels himself floating away the longer he stares. 

His body is still sitting there against his door, but that’s not him. Or is it? Aside from the staccato of his racing heart, everything just feels so… numb. As if the world has dulled in all of its sensations save for this space here with you. You. Reaching out his hand towards your body is just enough to pull himself back down. 

“What are we doing we doing with ourselves?” you ask airily, face pulled into a perpetual frown of deep-seated sadness.

Fuck if he knows. “Coping.” He’s well aware your question was most likely rhetorical, but he’s silently afraid you won’t continue speaking if he doesn’t respond.

Then you have a profound thought that livens your entire disposition if only for a second. “You know, it doesn’t matter that we’re not addicted to drugs like all those fuckers we catch. This ‘coping’ is still an addiction, and the brief happiness followed by a monumental crash into whatever the fuck is wrong with us is still the same.” Involuntarily, a sob makes its way out of you and you bring a distressed hand to your forehead. “I’m exhausted.”

“I am too.” Javier swallows the hard lump that’s formed in his throat, unable to do anything other than sit in discomfiture at this turn of events. 

He’s not good at dealing with heavy things, especially things that he can’t outwardly deflect. Because you’re not making him feel these things on purpose. You’re not probing, trying to fix something he doesn’t want fixing. The only person who’s making his vision blur with unshed tears is himself. He hates it. Hates the way your form becomes fuzzy the longer he tries so desperately to keep the tears at bay.

Meanwhile, your dam has shattered like the fragile glass it’s always been. Salty tears cascade in rivulets down your cheeks, getting into your mouth, sliding uncomfortably down your neck to your shirt. Sometimes you wonder if you’d still ended up like this—a broken shell of a person that fades away in an unwavering continuance—if you never became an agent. Thoughts like those are what keep you up at night, among other things. 

Along the floor between the two of you falling apart, the morning sun creeps through the window and shines off of the tile in a blinding, golden light. You both look towards it, then each other. And, wordlessly, you wipe your tears as Javier sighs, collecting himself, and you both head into your respective apartments to get ready for the day.


End file.
